Merry Christmas! -finally!

Nothing quite as exhilarating as waiting until the last minute! I finally finished my Christmas cards! All 24 this year! And here I thought I was cutting back...

This card gave me so much trouble! I was just trying to turn my Halloween card (see it HERE) into a Christmas card instead. I must have tried 7 different snowflake stamps for the center, 2 different embossing powders, and countless sparkles! All that and I ended up using my snowflake punch. 

 If you look closely, I sponged the background in blue to make my snowflake stand out. I also used Close To My Heart's clear Glitz Gel to make little sparkles on all the snowflakes. Every Christmas card needs a bit of bling!

Thanks for stopping by and MERRY CHRISTMAS from Tina's scrap crap!

Christmas box

I have mentioned before what creative people I get to hang out with being a Close To My Heart consultant; so I was TERRIFIED that I had to make a "Christmas something" for a swap with all those creative people! The only rule was to stay under $10 and use all CTMH products. This is what I came up with:

From the outside it just looks like a present, but open it up and...

It's an exploding box! I love making these for Christmas! Someday I will post pictures of my other ones with different themes. I left this one pretty generic so whoever ended up with it could personalize it themselves. 

There are 8 little pockets with journaling tags inside and room for at least 9-21 photos! 

I am happy to report that the woman who ended up with my exploding Christmas box was happy, and the rest of the group was so impressed that I am teaching them all how to make it in January!!! Talk about an honor!

Just goes to show that maybe we shouldn't be so hard on ourselves all the time!

The countdown begins! ...5 days ago

Ok, so I didn't finish on time. At least I was close this year... Here is the cute Christmas Countdown box I started early November:

I used Close To My Heart's memory game cube. It has a strong magnetic closure and is pretty kid-proof. It comes with a countdown-convenient 24 cards inside.

So I came up with 24 things to do each day and decorated! A good old fashioned glue stick seems to work best with the chipboard. Plus it's cheap! 

A little warning: when you first get this box all the squares fit inside with lots of room to spare; after you add a few layers of paper it becomes a pretty tight fit. If you are using all 24 squares, I would NOT recommend any 3D embellishments at all. They will not fit!

Maybe I should start my Christmas cards now...

November layouts

Wow, it's been awhile! Here are the layouts we made at my scrapbook group in November: (sorry, I don't have time to edit them so they are a little rough)

This first one uses the Sonoma paper packet. Honestly, when I first saw this packet I was not impressed. It was a little... dull for my normal scrapbook subjects (crazy kids). But I really love how this layout turned out. It has a very regal feel to it that I think will be perfect for photos of my kids with their great-grandparents. Even if they are jumping on the couch at the time!

Just a close up of my strategic accordion pleats! I wanted them evenly spaced with the brads, so this took a bit of scrap paper practice!

This last one is the gorgeous Dreamin' paper. The big blank white spot is where a big colorful 8x10 will go. I have fall leaf pictures of me and my husband a few years back (ok, 9 years back) that match great.  

Lots of leaf cutting, but I love the look! After I get the pictures on I am going to trace the flourishes with Bronze glitz gel to add a bit of sparkle! 

I know what you are thinking, why didn't she just cut out the leaves with the Cricut? All the leaf stamps have a matching cut? Well yes, I could have done that and it is much faster; but I wanted a closer cut than what the Cricut does. Also my Cricut is buried right now... maybe next time!

Thanks for looking, back to the sick baby!

Finally Fall!

It is about time things finally cooled off! I would soooo much rather be cold than hot. Think about it: when you are cold, you can put on a sweater; when you are hot, there is only so much naked you can get :)

Here is a card to celebrate breaking out the sweaters:

Pretty much everything I used is discontinued Close To My Heart... but the colors of this paper packet will always be one of my favorites! 

Happy Fall!

Back Away From The Heat Gun!

Apparently I am addicted to embossing lately! Here is my entry for the Heart 2 Heart Halloween challenge this week:

I love how this turned out! Plus it was a great excuse to use my spiderweb border punch :) Here is a close up of the part I am most proud of:

The spider stamp I had was too small, so after I stamped it in Versamark I used my embossing pen to make all the legs a little longer! It is hard to see exactly what you are doing with a clear embossing pen, so I was pleasantly surprised that it turned out AWESOME! Then I sponged grey around the spider and also in the center of the spider webs so it wasn't so bright. 

It is always nice when the finished product turns out just as good as the vision in your head at 4 am!

Hmmm...

Well, so much for posting twice a week!

I finally took pictures of the pages we made at my monthly scrapbook group! (If you are in the Pleasant Grove, Utah area, let me know if you ever want to join us) I am not sure why the photos are so poor, but here is a slightly blurry look:

This first one is the Roxie paper packet. We only used a few embellishments because I wanted the swirly paper to stand out. 

Here is a close-up of the title. It was a lot of strategic masking and embossing!

This next one is the Mischief paper packet. We also used the new spooky felt shapes which I now LOVE! 

I'm not sure how well you can tell, but this is a close up of the cool embossing technique I used on the border. (Click on the photo to enlarge it) I stamped the image first in colonial white and blotted it with a napkin, then stamped it in grey wool a few times to darken it. Last I stamped it in Versmark and embossed it with clear embossing powder slightly off to give a black shadow. Gotta love clear stamps!

Someone else's cute idea...

Ok, so this one is not mine, but I love it so much it's going up anyway!

Have I mentioned how creative my Close To My Heart upline is? I made this Halloween countdown at one of her workshops. You can visit Blyhte's blog HERE to see all her great artwork. This is a close up of the amazing roses from the new CTMH Cricut cartridge:

These ones have been sanded and beat up a bit (on purpose) so they are a bit rougher than normal. I love it!

On a side note, I am participating in the Fabulously Artsy Tresa Black's Blogtober Fest! If you have a few spare weeks to look at all her art, THIS is her blog. Not exaggerating! You will end up stalking her just like me, she is so creative! I am personally challenging myself to blog twice a week and try and learn more about this whole new-fangled blog thing :) Wish me luck!

October!

I LOVE Halloween!!! So I am very excited that it is finally October! I am also sick of the hot weather here, so I am hoping the calendar change will encourage the Earth to cool off a bit. Here is a card for everyone else counting down:

I think everything Halloween-related should have black and googly-eyes! I cut 1/2 inch strips of paper, inked them, and then just went crazy arranging! The entire center is popped up off of the black. I saw a card similar to this in a Close To My Heart book, but I honestly do not remember which one. Sorry! For those of you wanting to copy this be warned: this card is not nearly as quick and easy as it looks! Also expect your fingers to get very inky... cute though!

Make It From Your Heart Winner! (and loser)

Close To My Heart has a consultant contest called Make It From Your Heart each time a new catalog is released. They have a ton of categories to enter, so you think I would try to enter as many as possible to win... Instead I lost track of time and only entered two... But half of them won!

This is my winning card:

I used the Believe paper packet and a whole lot of patience! Here is a detail shot:

I became very comfortable with my Xacto knife after this tree! I stamped the outline image first, then cut out the windows, and then cut little paper pieces to fit. I painted the new Dimensional Elements Shapes stars and the edges of all the dark green with Pearl Paint. I stitched floss through the ribbon so I could tie on my circle tag. Insane amount of work? Yes! But I won!

This one is my loser... but I still like it:

I used the Wonderland paper packet and a lot of sparkles:

It is hard to see in the picture, but I stamped the Dimensional Elements snowflake with a design before sponging and painting it. I have always loved this card pattern! It is just so clean and elegant; perfect for an icy blue and sparkly winter card!

Thanks for looking! If you want to see more or know my exact recipes, they are all  HERE at Close To My Heart's site.

THANK YOU!!!

Holy Cow!!! I never thought I would ever get any comments, let alone another follower! You Heart 2 Heart girls are so nice! I will definitely be playing along with the challenges more often now! Here is a card to everyone who visited my blog lately:

Archivers had an extremely similar card for a make-and-take a few weeks back. I loved it and recreated (ok, copied) it with products that I had on hand. Yes, the little bird is quilled! My daughter really loved the whole quilling experience at Archivers and asked for an instruction book for her birthday. Of course I looked through it myself... so expect to see a few more quilled things coming soon! 

Thanks again to everyone for looking!

H2H Challenge

There is a Close To My Heart challenge blog that posts challenges every Monday. This is my first time ever playing along! This weeks challenge is to create something using cardstock ONLY; no patterned paper. I just happened to be working on a card that fit the criteria perfectly:

Before you think I am cheating, let me say that the green polka-dot was created with white cardstock and a circle punch! No patterned paper! This is also my favorite color combo of the moment. If you want to know what my baby's nursery looks like, this card is a good clue!

Happy (late) Grandparents Day!

I was early making all the cards, on time delivering most of them, and apparently late posting anything. So here is what at least 4 sets of grandparents saw yesterday:

If you own the Close To My Heart card book "Wishes", this card may look a tad familiar! I loved the colors and the layout, so it's pretty much a copy using different stamps and a flower punch. Hope yesterday was a great day for all the grandparents out there!

This is my brain...

If something is going to get done, it has to be on the fridge. That's just how it is. So each month I make a calendar front and center to keep track of life: 

Here is September's all pretty and blank. 30 days from now this poor page will be covered in my horrible handwriting and smudged with fingerprints. I promised myself when I started the calendar thing that I would not "sensor" the end product. When the calendar gets a little beat up it just shows posterity what life was truly like around here. Then at the end of the year I make a matching page with a few photos and ta-da! Instant 2011 scrapbook! 

Blog Challenge #26

Nothing like waiting until the last second! I decided weeks ago to enter My Mind's Eye's blog challenge and just never posted my layout! So here it is:

The Abby Road My Mind's Eye line was perfect for these pictures! The challenge is a one-page sketch, but I can never scrapbook just one page. My left page is inspired by the sketch, and the right page I made up all by myself for fun! Yes, my son's face is covered by a fish marble... let's make a long story short and just say that my husband and I took way too many criminal justice classes in college; this is the only way I will post pictures of my children!

Mini Cards!

I finally got a chance to play with the new papers from Close To My Heart! The new idea book came out August 1st with 8 new paper packs to choose from... so of course I couldn't choose and had to do something with all of them. I was heavily inspired by the 8 little cards we made at my last unit meeting. That's the best thing about being a consultant. I get to hang out with extremely creative people! All of the cards are 3x3 with lots of dimension:

 Typeset

 Elemental

 Dreamin'

 Sonoma

 Mischief

 Believe

 Wonderland

Roxie

I promise they aren't fuzzy in real life! Still working out this photography-to-blog thing...

I used the new color-ready butterflies and stars, ribbon, brads, the "Live Your Style" stamp set, tons of 3-D foam tape, and lots of sparkles! I have a few kits left over from my monthly club, so if you are interested email me at steeltulip@hotmail.com. All 8 cards are all stamped and cut; all you do is sponge the edges and glue them together! Each kit is $10 + shipping (sorry, only US). 

Thanks for looking!

Hello blog world!

Ok Aunt Chantre, today I looked out the window and saw a pig landing gracefully like a butterfly in my backyard; so it was time to start a blog!

Hello and welcome to my little chunk of the crafty world!

The goal is to use this blog to force myself to be creative more often. I have found that unless I am accountable to someone, even things I enjoy doing just don't get done! Hopefully you will see lots of artwork, links, and even some tutorials as I get this going. Please be patient as I learn how to post...

Now that we are done with the intro, here is the reason I started making cards:

Not quite sure what's happening with the color, but you get the idea. I entered this card in the Close To My Heart consultant contest in January and WON! This card uses the Sophia paper, pearls, a discontinued stamp set (sorry), and my favorite sweet leaf green ribbon. The ribbon is stitched on both edges, so all you have to do to gather it is pull on the stitching! Just make sure you tie off the other end first or you'll just pull the string all the way out... Here is a detail close-up:

Now maybe I can be motivated to create another card! Thanks for visiting!